EVs cost 22% less to service than ICE cars, new data shows
fleetworld.co.uk
fleetworld.co.uk
Wiper fluid, replace 12v battery (due to COVID and not driving).
That's it.
I did go to the tire shop but they pulled a screw from the tire, patched it up and told me there's plenty of tread. They also inspected the brake pads and they were years away from replacement (due to regen braking).
None of the following I had to do for my first 5 years owning an ICE car:
* fuel, oil, air filter replacement * replace oil, brake pads. * (if you're unlucky) transmission/engine repair
Never having to visit a gas station (unless I'm low on tire pressure) is zen.
Where you will run into problems with brakes is due to corrosion if you live in a climate where roads are salted in the winter. Since the pads last so much longer, there is a danger that the disposable parts that are designed to last the normal lifetime of pads will corrode and fail before the pads wear out.
FWIW, in 5 years, replaced my wiper blades, tires, and washer fluid and that's it.
But in most (all?) EVs you have regenerative braking that reduces the load on the brake pads, so they last longer. You can kinda do the same in an ICE by coasting down but it takes a lot more preplanning and annoys impatient people behind you.
And that was a nothing fancy Hyundai.
(And of course if you drive manual you can do this yourself).
One could shift the automatic gear selector to 3 or 2 (or whatever you have) to engine brake in most autos. This is taught as a thing to do if your brakes fail.
But on my manual, I can take a freeway exit and do most of my braking from 120km/h to about 15km/h through the engine. And similar if the light ahead turns red.
This is actually what you’re supposed to do in a manual: be in gear at all times so you can accelerate if you have to.
My brakes will probably last 3-4x longer than an automatic’s.
Letting the drag slow the vehicle in an automatic is still a win -- your instantaneous MPG goes to >99 and you save wear and tear on multiple parts of the vehicle. It's a really big win, and with people so antsy about the price of fuel (aka the cost of driving) I'm shocked to observe how many people are still driving in very expensive manners (fast starts, hard braking)
I frequently coast up to red lights and stop signs, shedding 25-50% of my miles per hour, but brake wear is greater under heavier loads so doing 25% less breaking is a lot more than 25% savings on wear & tear.
I'm not sure what % is a "significant" threshold for you, but >25% is definitely significant to me.
With an ICE, I have no idea whether the wear and tear you avoid on the brakes is offset by the strain you put on the engine or if it saves or wastes gas. Don't know don't care. I just do it because I am Walter Mitty.
That said, if I had to rely on public charging for my day to day, I’d be in the same spot as a gas car —- or worse, with only access to a level 2 charger.
I was in Steamboat this weekend, and for some reason they have no superchargers. Relying on a level 2 charger giving me 10% charge after an hour was.. tedious at best. I would not want an EV if that was my regular experience. It’s one reason I’d never recommend anything except a Tesla until there are widespread level 3 chargers for all brands.
Or, you use a carshare, and the car is located in a garage/lot where it spends every minute it's not in use plugged into a charger.
EVs aren't a solution to the unsustainability of individual car ownership in high population density areas.
There's no (usable) car sharing services that I'm aware of where I live.
So in my experience, having an electric car in London is super convenient. There's myriad ways to charge it and increasingly good rapid charging options along major routes. But I'm sure that's not everyone's experience in every neighborhood or city. Hopefully things keep improving as rapidly as they have been.
NB: I have seen someone in London string a charging cable up through their non-ground-floor apartment window once, but only once :)
Plus, while what you say is probably feasible for bigger cities, I'm not convinced yet that small to medium sized cities will introduce something similar anytime soon, or is it the case in the UK?
Just out of curiosity: how far apart are the lamp posts in London? How difficult is it to actually get a parking spot by one? Can more than one car in the vicinity of a lamp post charge their car or only one per post?
The hazards of buying a car with a proprietary DC fast charge network, I guess. Especially given how CCS chargers are now twice the speed of Superchargers and less 'oversubscribed.'
That's more impressive than the engine tech.
Please share more details.
My car has a blinker light in the outside mirrors, the right one of which stopped working after I reversed into a wall with the mirrow. I replaced the mirror glass but didn't bother about the light, given that the ones in the front and back of the car worked perfectly fine. Well, that was enough for them not letting me pass the inspection - I had four weeks to get it fixed, otherwise my car would have been off the road. The repair set me back almost 500 Euros, for an effing small blinker light...
The only thing that was a close call was the passenger window would stick sometimes but it rolled down for the inspection so we were good to go.
80k mile warranty. They should have plenty of tread at 50k miles.
I bought this tool on the battery platform of the rest of my power tools: https://www.makitatools.com/products/details/DMP180ZX
Best $120 I've ever spent! Can't recommend enough. Also great for inflatable mattresses, kiddie pools, basketballs, and shuts off automatically when it gets to the pressure you set.
But FYI for anyone else who is having this struggle: most tire places will check and fill up your tires for free (even if you didn't buy tires from them).
> California law requires that station operators provide free air and water to customers who purchase gasoline or diesel fuel. [2: Complaint form if you were denied]
[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/bayarea/comments/3sp0jj/fyi_gas_sta...
[2] https://apps4.cdfa.ca.gov/AirWaterComplaint/#:~:text=Califor....
It doesn't actually take very long even from nothing and since it's designed for high pressure it doesn't even take much effort to get up to normal car tire pressures.
As opposed to AC getting worked for a few years and the cabin air filter merely getting stinky, but manageable.
Yes.
> How much does that cost including all parts and labor as a percentage of the vehicle's value?
I think you are overestimating the time it take to replace a battery with appropriate equipment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23qFN9sLjVU
Initially only leased batteries were available, so there is still a lot of people with leased batteries, and batteries get swapped for free when capacity drop below 75%.
The trick is that the battery capacity rarely go below 75%.
Battery replacement is something very rare (which make leasing a bad deal), 10 years laters there is still very few peoples that peoples that made their car batteries replaced.
A 2002 model year Toyota 4Runner in decent running condition still retains significant value today, and can be easily repaired with commonly available parts. In 2042, will we be able to say the same about any EV being sold today?
What actually happened: a cottage industry for repairing the battery packs sprung up to meet demand or when they'd fail, which wasn't that often (and indeed, Hybrid Camrys became the standard taxi cab in a number of US cities, racking up hundreds of thousands of miles on their batteries.) There are shops all around the country that do cell replacement now and getting your hybrid battery pack serviced is less painful than a lot of major engine repairs.
Bolt EVs were (in large part due to GM's extremely conservative charge profiles for DCFC) seeing much less battery degradation than expected. Right up until the manufacturing defects reared their head...and GM has replaced all the batteries, giving them a very long warranty...8, maybe 10 years? I forget which.
> If ev's ever come down in price
You can buy several EV models new for under $30k, which is substantially less than the median car price in the US.
Speaking of Bolts, two years ago you could buy one with 30k miles on it for $15-18k. Can't now!
The argument that EV's are too expensive based solely off the purchase price while ignoring everything else gets tiresome. My take is lower maintenance costs and depreciation beats out the difference between the cost of electricity vs gas. 5 cents/mile vs 12-15 cents a mile. That's only 7 to 10 cents/mile difference. EV's cost less to run even if gasoline were free.
And speaking of, would you dare buy a used ev car? You probably are talking at least 10K for a ten year old EV, and then if the battery is shot, and you now have to dump another 8K at least. Used EVs, imo, are a risky purchase.
The minimum battery warranty for an EV in the US is 8 years or 100k miles[1], and crowdsourced reports of battery degradation over time suggest that (at least for Tesla vehicles) it is not a major issue; range loss averages out to around 11% at 200k miles[2], which is the expected EOL for most ICE vehicles[3]. There are anecdotal reports of high-mileage EVs running on the same battery for over 350k miles[4] and 620k miles[5] without issue.
[0] https://hedgescompany.com/blog/2022/02/how-old-are-cars/
[1] https://www.myev.com/research/buyers-sellers-advice/evaluati...
[2] https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1c3m9wqlxPBo8ziDYVm5c...
[3] https://www.caranddriver.com/research/a32758625/how-many-mil...
[4] https://insideevs.com/news/342457/this-tesla-model-x-90d-cov...
[5] https://jalopnik.com/one-tesla-model-s-has-gone-nearly-1-mil...
1. There are only 9 data points for only 1 brand of EVs on that sheet. This is essentially anecdotal data. There are 10 data points (just as many) of batteries under 80% of capacity with varying mileages. What happened with those? As a consumer, I don't want to get bad luck of the draw and be one of those.
2. The 1 million mile Tesla is on its 3rd battery pack. It's not a valid observation. At best we can surmise that a battery pack can last roughly ~333,333 miles under good conditions. But this is still a premium vehicle (P85) that is out of reach of most consumers with a large battery pack.
What would the numbers be for a Nissan 45 kWh pack for example? If it's roughly half of 333k, then it's not as impressive anymore. Maybe 1/3 of that?
The biggest issue though is that EVs still carry a substantial premium above ICE vehicles, which can only be realized in savings over a long period of high gasoline prices ($5+).
Unless you have some electrical breakdown or something like that many batteries that we are building now can easily last 20+ years.
The simplicity of Evs can’t be denied on serviceability. The only argument comes down to ignorance.
An ev would be better than this and in comparison to a modern ice, much much better.
As for being jellybeans, sure roller bearings you can spend an hour searching a part catalog and find something similar. But those aren’t the ones I keep spares or would swap over from my spare parts box.
Even engine bearings are becoming hard to find now on a once reasonably popular motor
As compared to an EV which rarely needs parts that each cost thousands of dollars.
The ICE car costs more total, but spread over a large number of smaller payments.
and there's a lot of experience built around them over the decades.
We now have atleast 6 cars between my family, none under 200k miles, 2 of which have 300k+ miles. Haven't done a major repair in a decade maybe. I'd say the most difficult thing I've done is replaced a radiator and an alternator.
You can't go by how often a Dodge Durango blows up to talk about how troublesome ICE cars are. Anyone that wants trouble free ownership just buys a Toyota or Honda and calls it a day. Everyone else, that's on purpose and shouldn't really be used against the actual ICE concept.
FTA:
"National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA), the new-vehicle department of a car dealership accounts for about 58% of a dealership's total sales but less than 26% of a dealership's total gross profit. "
"So where does the majority of a dealership's profit come from? It's not from car sales, at least not directly. It's from the service and parts department, which accounts for the other 49.6% of the dealership's gross profits, according to NADA"
My comment was based on what I have been told by people in the business. They all want to get cars out the door...and raw counts are more important than margins on each. I would say that any new car under warranty will absolutely be serviced at the dealer. After that? Agreed...people will find alternatives. Mind you, in my experience, only "car people" tend to find non-dealer service...many feel "safer" at the dealer. I am told that the manufacturers of the cars make the most profit on a new vehicle sale...not the dealer. This is also why the lease/used market is so attractive to dealers.
It’s hard to believe my maintenance costs could fall. But it would be really nice if they do.
I never did. I am ashamed, but also impressed.
We have 2 of the same car and both receive this crappy treatment and have yet to fail us.
Low KM use.
It was a $1200 car. You don't spend a bunch of money on maintenance for a $1200 car.
Throw it in the gutter and go buy another.
Saving a few hundred dollars over the course of fifteen years by buying a car that’s tens of thousands of dollars more expensive doesn’t make sense.
The fuel savings might make up the difference, though. Silly to highlight maintenance expenses when fuel costs are an order of magnitude greater.
I still have to pay the annual service, but nothing ever broke. The Lexus service takes care of filters, oil, and scheduled replacements when it's due. One of the milestones was 100000 km mark and service was a bit more expensive.
Funny because I even never had to refill the wiper fluid. They refill it with the annual service and apparently I don't use it enough to empty it before the next service.
Never took the Leaf to a shop for "official maintenance" other than an a general evaluation early on.
With the Bolt, I never had any issues during my ownership that took my vehicle offline/out of my hands. I replaced all four tires once, at my own expense, because I wanted a different tradeoff from the OEM tire choice. I took it to the shop once for a tire rotation/cabin air filter replacement at a regular service interval, and was about to do so a second time when I totaled the car this past Memorial Day weekend.
All told, I'm still totally unfamiliar with anyone visiting my home for any kind of automotive service.
I still need to compile and review my vehicle expenses from the past 7 years of EV ownership, but at the end of the day, all an EV needs in 5-10 years/100-200k miles of usage is regular tire rotations/replacements, wiper replacements, and cabin air filters to your preferences. There's literally nothing else to do on the Chevy Bolt EV maintenance schedule until 150,000 miles, when it's recommended to drain and refill the vehicle coolant circuits.[0]
[0] https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/chevy-bolt-maintenance-sc...
Maybe the one garage mentioned that charges more for labor when it's an EV isn't the exception.
> It also uncovered that the parts component of a BEV job is typically 28% cheaper than an ICE car due to them having fewer working parts, with brake wear far lower
Not sure if comparing 850,000 fleet cars and vans with high end EVs (a majority of EVs in UK are still high end cars) it's a fair comparison.
Of course brake wear on vans is going to be an order of magnitude worse than a Tesla or a Porsche Taycan, with their oversized braking systems.
> But Fleet Assist, which has provided the analysis, warns that the SMR price reductions are not guaranteed in the longer term due to the rising operating costs of garages.
it's not clear why that should make a difference between ICE and EV.
> “Garages are already starting to come to terms with how EVs will impact their servicing revenues and workshop traffic in the longer term. We may see more garages looking at ways to address how the paradigm shift of BEV aftersales is going to challenge their service provision and fees they charge,”
So basically, sounds like there is still more "fluff work" that garages can do nowadays on ICE cars to make more money and are not ready to do the same for EVs yet.
But the day when they'll invent the (unnecessary) "you absolutely need a change of oil" or "break pads are gone, we have to change them" for EVs is just around the corner.
that's specifically why I've mentioned "high end cars".
Most hybrid cars use it too.
Most high end ABS systems are way more gentle on the brake pads than a 20 years old Ford Transit van.
> In my car I barely use the brakes at all
that's what most good drivers have been doing in the past 50 years.
Especially on manual.
Too bad I didn't say that.
I was specifically referring to brake wear.
But even though high end cars cost more to repair in absolute, they are usually built for higher durability.
Except probably Tesla.